Thoracic Surgery in the Elderly: Heart and Vessels

Abstract

The elderly in this chapter are defined as patients over the age of 65 years. This is an arbitrary definition and in some units (and publications) 70 years is taken as the lower limit of this group of patients. It should be pointed out most emphatically that physiological rather than temporal age is significant and it is well known that a patient of 70 years but with well-preserved cardiorespiratory and renal reserves will have a better prognosis than a patient with the same correctable lesion in whom these reserves have been severely depleted. Since the more complex and severe congenital cardiac malformations often prove to be fatal in the first few months of life, it is obvious that they will not be encountered in this age group. On the other hand, the effects of ischaemia and degeneration will more frequently require surgical intervention.